Suspenders that hold a wearer's pants at waist level typically have a pair of straps that hang over the wearer's shoulders and connect to the pants at three or four points using fasteners.
Suspenders or straps are often used with outer pants that are worn over trousers, such as ski pants, fireman's pants, waders, and rain pants. Suspenders are useful to hold up the outer pants because the overgarments extend well above the waist of the wearer, making a belt uncomfortable or even useless. Over pants are often worn under heavy jackets or coats that must be removed before the undergarment (e.g., the pants) can be taken down. When suspenders are used to suspend pants under one or more outer garments (e.g., jackets, coats, parkas, raincoats), those outer garments often are removed before the pants can be lowered or removed because the suspenders usually attach to the pants in three or four places, one or more of which is typically at the rear of the wearer and hard to reach. For a wearer to lower the pants, the wearer removes the outer garments, passes his or her arms back through the suspenders, allowing the pants and suspenders to drop. If the floor is not clean, such as in a public restroom the suspenders may be soiled if they touch the floor.